Passengers aboard Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 likely would have died if the door came loose while it was flying at normal cruising altitude, an expert said.
Physics professor Arun Bansil of Northeastern University said the loss of cabin pressure at 40,000 feet would have caused all 177 people on board to lose consciousness in just 10 seconds.
Instead, disaster was averted because the plane was only six minutes into the flight and was still climbing at an altitude of about 16,000 feet.
Officials are now investigating the disastrous incident on January 5, which left terrified passengers fearing for their lives.
The Boeing 737 Max 9 aircraft was just minutes into its flight from Portland, Oregon to California when the unused exit door blew open and came loose.
The Boeing 737 Max 9 plane was just minutes into its journey from Portland, Oregon, to California when the unused exit door blew open and came loose. Pictured: Post-accident interior view, showing the missing door plug and damaged seats
Although no one was killed, some passengers had their clothing ripped off as the cabin lost pressure at 16,000 feet – known as a ‘depressurization emergency’.
As Professor Bansil explains, the higher the altitude, the lower the air pressure.
Low air pressure means that the surrounding air is less dense and therefore contains less oxygen. That’s why we get altitude sickness when we go up a mountain.
Maintaining higher pressure in the aircraft cabin is crucial to ensure that people on board can breathe properly and do not faint.
The danger is that the pressure difference between the outside and inside of the cabin increases with height, because the pressure in the pressurized cabin is kept constant.
“If part of the fuselage blows off, the higher-pressure air in the cabin spews out – much like when a filled balloon is punctured – resulting in a depressurization emergency,” Professor Bansil told Northeastern Global News.
‘If the pressure in the cabin decreases, the air pressure and therefore the oxygen pressure in the cabin decreases, making it more difficult for the lungs to supply sufficient oxygen to the blood.
‘This leads to dizziness and decline in cognitive skills, and ultimately to unconsciousness and death.’
At 16,000 feet, it takes about 30 minutes for people to “lose their ability to function” due to the lack of oxygen – and that’s without deploying oxygen masks.
The flight that was supposed to arrive at Ontario International in California turned back after the plug door came loose on the night of January 5.
The Alaska Airlines plane had to make an emergency landing at Portland International Airport on Friday evening after a large part of the plane blew out in the air.
But at 40,000 feet it’s closer to 10 seconds – meaning they have less time to react and fatalities are more likely.
“The physiological effects of rapid depressurization at 40,000 feet are much more severe,” the academic said.
“Passengers at 40,000 feet will lose their ability to function usefully within ten seconds if oxygen masks are not deployed, and death will follow shortly thereafter.”
Considering that it only takes 10 minutes for an aircraft to reach full altitude between 33,000 and 42,000 feet, it could have been a fatal event if the door came off a few minutes later.
The first six minutes of Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 from Portland to Ontario International Airport in Southern California – with 171 passengers and six crew on board – passed without incident.
The Boeing 737 Max 9 was about halfway to its cruising altitude and traveling at more than 400 miles per hour.
Flight attendants had just told the 171 passengers they could resume using electronic devices in airplane mode when a 2-by-4-foot piece of fuselage covering a non-operational emergency exit behind the left wing suddenly blew out.
The oxygen masks immediately fell off and a flight attendant was reported walking down the aisle toward the affected row, hunched over as if facing a strong wind.
In the photo, investigators recovered the door plug from the backyard of a home in Cedar Hills, Oregon
Flight attendants then began moving passengers from the area where the blowout occurred, including a teenager named Jack, whose seat belt kept him from being sucked out of the plane.
According to another passenger, Kelly Bartlett, the sound of the wind was so loud that they could not hear the captain’s announcements.
But the flight attendants responded “very well” and it felt like “just a normal descent” when the plane made an emergency landing at its origin, Portland International Airport.
After landing, paramedics came on board and helped a few people who had “minor injuries” before everyone else got off the plane, Ms Bartlett recalled.
Two days later, the National Transportation Safety Board recovered the door in the backyard of a suburban Portland home, while cell phones that were still turned on were also recovered.
The Federal Aviation Administration said it has notified Boeing that it is conducting an investigation to determine whether the company “has failed to ensure that completed products conform to the approved design” and are “capable of to operate safely’.